There are very few games I'll take two days off work to play
through in their entirety, but Dragon Age 2 is
one of them.

It's the latest role-playing game from
Bioware (Baldur's Gate, Mass Effect), and follows
2009's critically acclaimed Dragon Age: Origins -- a game
that took classic fantasy RPG elements and splattered it with blood
and elf-sex in a way Bethesda's Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
stopped just short of. Given Origins' phenomenal
achievement as a modern epic delivered near-perfectly, Dragon
Age 2 becomes the gaming equivalent of a breakthrough band's
difficult second album. As such, it falls down in places its
predecessor didn't, fixing things that weren't broken. Nonetheless,
Bioware has created another deeply compelling fantasy
experience.

You play Hawke, the eventual "champion" (read: hero) of the
vast, multicultural city of Kirkwall -- the neighbouring nation to
Ferelden, in which Dragon Age: Origins was set. You fled
Ferelden after the events of the first game and arrive at Kirkwall
as part of a group of dirty, frowned-upon refugees,
and you'll need to rise up to become the nation's celebrated
saviour. Your playthough of DA2 spans a decade of your
life in Kirkwall, and during that time your actions, decisions,
allegiances and battles shape the future fate of the entire nation
and its political and social societies.

Like DA:Origins, DA2's non-linear story means
you'll spend most of your time exploring the eclectic world of
Kirkwall and its outskirts, completing side-quests and unravelling
backstories that flesh out the foundations that underpin the main
plot. But where DA2differs is with how this plot is
delivered: the events of the game are being recited as a history,
told in chapters in the present day by one of the main character's
old companions -- essentially, the game is one giant flashback.
It's an approach that works well, and the cutscenes in which your
story is seen being told nicely bridge the gaps between the three
distinct chapters of the game's decade-spanning plot.

The downside to this is that each of these chapters are
individual stories with their own self-contained arcs and climaxes,
so much of your side-questing has only modest relevance to the main
story. It doesn't make the game any less fun, but it also doesn't
give the player a sense they're continually aiming towards one
satisfyingly epic, world-changing, final confrontation in the way
Origins, Oblivion and most other RPGs do.

But what is does is give you an ending that's massively
influenced by the decisions you made throughout the game -- who you
befriended, who loves you, who hates you, who you didn't kill.
DA2's revamped dialogue system -- the "conversation wheel"
borrowed from Mass Effect -- is the key here, as it allows you to
pick responses with an emotional bias in conversations throughout
the game, and results in there being no clear good or evil route
dictated to you through the game, and thus no obvious climax with a
universally hated opposition. Who or what you make an enemy of
throughout the game is down to you, and it's this
choice-determined, character-centric way of telling a story that
makes Dragon Age 2 so enjoyable.

It also means you can play through the game multiple times and
have entirely different experiences, befriending and learning about
characters you never even met the first time round, and perhaps
killing -- rather than falling in love -- with those you did.
Bioware's greatest success with Dragon Age 2, then, is its
compelling use of character dialogue, and companions and enemies
you can care about. Voice acting and facial expression animation is
so superbly executed you'll find yourself pausing often to consider
which response to give in a conversation -- if you anger someone
who actually likes you in the game, you'll cringe when they show
their disappointment. As well, the lead character is now fully
voiced, and it makes a tangible difference to how you interact with
the people around you.

Comments

I guess I feel a little different =) I would rate DA2 a bit higher than DA:O but that's just because I connect better with my Hawke when voiced as opposed to my silent warden that I still love to bits. Playing my 3:rd Hawke right now and now I would say that the changes in tone for the voice is one of the best things they did for DA2. It actually changes what the companions and nps have to say also and possible outcomes in q's. You can't see that on just one Hawke but it becomes apparent if you replay with a new overall tone. That and the companions are my major favs for the game. My favs are Varric, Fenris and Aveline.A little bit closed in in Kirkwall, but I guess that they will introduce the bigger changes in Thedas that has happened during these 10 years in DA3.

Maria

Apr 24th 2011

I have to comment about the above reviews. Feeling 'truly in control of how the story evolves' should be more than just in control of a few line of text that is offered. I found little of my choices really effecting anything other than the conversation options i had. You expect a game to go a general direction granted, im not living on a dfferent planet, but from a game that prides its self on a user controlled experience i found it lacking almost completely. The ultimate test is to play a game twice and see what changes, and in this game, the answer sadly, is not enough.